As most know, all of Australia has been engulfed in flames for the past two and a half months. Some have wondered what the cause of the fire was and some have related it to climate change, which in America has a very controversial past. 

The people of Australia have always experienced small bush fires. They even have a time of year known as “fire season”. But according to some, this year has been much worse than usual. 

In fact, these are the worst fires the continent has seen since 2009 with wildlife death toll coming in at around 1 billion, which is the largest number ever reported from a wildfire. 

The cause of the fires across Australia is not yet known for sure, but many people have firmly believed climate change is the cause of all this mess. Over the past century, the earth’s atmosphere has been greatly damaged with all the pollution that has occurred in recent years. And damage to the earth’s atmosphere than, in turn, causes a drastic change in weather. According to online sources, it was discovered that in 2018, around 76 million tons of pollution was emitted into the atmosphere in the United States. 

Many deniers of climate change are claiming that a possible cause of the fires could be lightning. Recent storms have had higher rates and larger lightning strikes that created 50% more lightning in a given storm world-wide. These claims, however, do not withstand common science. Heightened lightning rates is directly related to rising humidity and global temperatures.

Along with that, The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization released a statement in 2013 that Australia is progressively getting hotter. It came as a shock knowing that Australia was already known for its heat. This information only negates climate change disbelievers’ claims even more. 

Make no mistake, climate change has greatly affected other large areas as well. Including Africa, the Arctic, small islands in Asia, and much more. The reality is, the earth is producing and receiving tons and tons of pollution which can only lead to hotter summers, colder winters, stronger winds, and more intense natural disasters. But there are ways to prevent such events, and possibly these extreme life-threatening fires. 

Your work commute. Most drive to their place of work, but the gas being exerted from the car pipes is very deadly to the earth’s atmosphere. As an alternative, you could bike to work, or skateboard. Another way to help prevent climate change is to be more green with your energy use. As in, if you started using solar panels for most things, including your lamps, ovens, televisions, etc. Just using solar energy for those three things, would greatly decrease the amount of energy power plants expend into the atmosphere. 

In brief, what’s happening in Australia is unbelievably devastating. Though the cause is not set in stone, the U.S. has been discussing the topic of climate change, forever, especially in the past five years. Though some have taken huge steps in the right direction, that will never be enough unless large influential countries like the US start making changes. Until that day comes, Australia will stay on fire, ice capsules will continue to melt, and several species of wildlife will end up extinct. Climate change is happening all around us, and we need to take action.